Liberty Alone

Having just finished Rainbows End, in which wearable computers, ubiquitous ad-hoc networks and contact lens displays are deeply ingrained in society, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the first contact lens displays have been made. Displays in glasses have been around for a while now, although not good enough for general use. We could be living in an augmented reality soon though.

The other ideas are already coming about too.
Ad-hoc networks are occurring already, some new mobile phones are seeking to take advantage of them, the One Laptop Per Child project is hoping to create one, many handheld consoles make use of ad-hoc networking and Amazon’s Kindle can take advantage of such an infrastructure.

Wearable computing is often talked about, and in a sense we already have such devices in the form of wrist watches. More complex devices are mostly held back by user interface and storage difficulties. Storage is getting smaller and smaller, also, combined with ad-hoc networks you could store information remotely. A usable UI is more challenging and will require a shift away from the desktop GUI model, but will be aided by augmented reality.

Of course, these trends are fairly easy to see as possibilities. Whether they will come about is less certain (where are our jet packs?) and how the world will be changed by them is another matter.

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